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Gah I'm sooo frustrated with my laptop!
I'm not that tech savy, so please bear with me
I have a newish acer laptop that uses windows 7.
About 2 days ago, I tried to log onto the internet and found that my computer is picking up our wireless network connection and even showing 'connected'; however when you look at the connection bars it shows 'no internet access'.
Here's what I've tried:
-system restore to a day that my internet was working
-uninstalling/reinstalling the router info.
-troubleshooting/scanning for problems (wasn't able to identify anything)
When I view the 'network and sharing center' it shows that my computer is connected to the 'unidentified network'; however the unidentified network does not seem to be connected to the internet (the internet works fine on our stationary computers).
If you are connecting to an "unidentified network" it's probably one down the street (Hence the lack of bars) and not yours.
If you left click the bars icon on the task bar (There is an assumption here that yours is displayed) you should see a list of available connections with the names and the bars showing signal strength.
You may find yours there.
If the bars icon is not in the task bar then go to Network and Sharing Center and click on "Connect or Disconnect" which is on the right side just under the graphic showing your connections. That will bring up a list of the available wireless connections.
You should change the SSID of your router so you know it's yours and add a password (I don't think that's the correct term, but my old brain can't find the right one) so it's secure.
If you don't know how post that here and help will come. The techs here love a good challenge.
I don't know why it's called an 'unidentified network'...but that's my connection that I have for our house. I already have it password protected and have tried entering and re-entering the password just in case I accidentally hit something along the way and it still won't connect.
Once again this morning I removed our connection and then had our computer try to find it again and it does right away. When I open the network and sharing I noticed that it is now connecting from my computer to our network, but our network can't connect to the internet (although both desktop computers are working just fine with the internet).
I also tried to delete the bonjour thing that people talked about online...but it wasn't on my device in the first place.
Being connected to the wireless network does not guarantee internet access. Kinda like you can have your TV plugged into the cable box, but the cable box is not connected to the cable provider.
Your laptop probably does not have a valid IP address because the router didn't give it one. Sometimes routers just refuse to reset themselves.
Normally the Windows 7 network troubleshooter does a good job of fixing all this. You might try running it. Running system restore was a bold step but very drastic and probably not necessary.
I would:
1. power off all computers in the house.
2. power off the router.
3. power off the cable modem (or DSL modem)
4. wait 10 seconds
5. power ON the cable modem
6. power on the router
7. power on your laptop
Being connected to the wireless network does not guarantee internet access. Kinda like you can have your TV plugged into the cable box, but the cable box is not connected to the cable provider.
Your laptop probably does not have a valid IP address because the router didn't give it one. Sometimes routers just refuse to reset themselves.
Normally the Windows 7 network troubleshooter does a good job of fixing all this. You might try running it. Running system restore was a bold step but very drastic and probably not necessary.
I would:
1. power off all computers in the house.
2. power off the router.
3. power off the cable modem (or DSL modem) 4. wait 10 seconds
5. power ON the cable modem
6. power on the router
7. power on your laptop
Excellent suggestion! Our ISP recommends waiting until the modem has finished connecting to the Internet before starting the router.
I disconnect from our connection, delete it from our network sharing center and then try to connect...I purposely entered a wrong password and tried to connect. When that didn't work I tried the troubleshooter just to see what it would say. When that wasn't able to identify a problem, I once again tried to connect using the correct password and it connected instantly!
I don't know why it suddenly worked, but as soon as I turned off my laptop for the night and tried again this morning, it wasn't connected.
I disconnect from our connection, delete it from our network sharing center and then try to connect...I purposely entered a wrong password and tried to connect. When that didn't work I tried the troubleshooter just to see what it would say. When that wasn't able to identify a problem, I once again tried to connect using the correct password and it connected instantly!
I don't know why it suddenly worked, but as soon as I turned off my laptop for the night and tried again this morning, it wasn't connected.
Any ideas?
Even though wireless is not my forte, I have seen this happen on one of the user's laptop at work. Due to a pesky infection, one of the things I had to do was to hide the user's original profile and then have Windows create a new one when the user logged in the next time. This also fixed his wireless issue that he was having which sounded very similar to yours.
Instead of re-creating your profile, you can create a completely different user profile and log on as that user then try to connect and see if it works.
If it does then you will know for sure the problem is profile based and that re-creating a new profile will resolve your issue.
Someone might come up with a better solution but I just wanted to throw this suggestion at you as an option.
Let me know if you want to know how to re-create the same user profile on Windows 7 properly as it's not as simple and direct as it was on XP.
Simply logging on as the local admin (or admin equivalent) profile to hide the profile directory doesn't cut it, you will have to get rid of couple of registry values.
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